Oliver ran through the forest, lungs burning, eyes fixed on the faint hoof prints and broken grass ahead.
The Rock Snout Boar's trail was not hard to follow.
Its fat body had trampled a very clear path, snapping branches and crushing bushes like a living battering ram.
"To the left," Ethan said from the bag. "It turned after that rock."
Oliver adjusted his path without thinking.
What he did not know was that Ethan was just as surprised as he was calm.
As a sandal, his body lay against Oliver's waist, but his senses spread in a circle around them.
He could feel the flow of mana within ten meters.
If he focused, he could even sense small bugs crawling under the leaves, watching them with their beady eyes.
'What is this power?' Ethan thought. 'I can see more clearly like this than with my old eyes.'
He did not say that out loud, of course. It was better to pretend this was normal.
"Keep going," he said. "The idiot pig is not far. It stopped ahead."
Oliver pushed past a clump of bushes.
The stream curved here, forming a small muddy patch.
At the edge, the pink boar stood with its front legs braced, snout digging furiously into the ground.
Mud flew behind it in messy clumps as it tried to uproot something buried below.
"Found you," Oliver muttered.
His gaze swept the surroundings. He grabbed a fallen branch leaning against a nearby tree.
It was about as long as his height, not too thick, not too thin, and flexible enough to act like a spear.
A slow smile appeared on his face.
"This time," he said through his teeth, "I will definitely turn you into bacon, you damned pig."
He moved quietly, step by step, keeping low as he approached from behind.
As he walked around, the boar's rear came into view again, pink and round, swaying slightly as it dug.
Oliver's smile widened.
Ethan understood at once what he was thinking.
"Your thoughts are very dangerous," Ethan said, but his voice was already full of laughter.
"Fine. In that case, gather mana in your legs. Use the branch to seal its favorite weapon."
Oliver did not argue.
He took a deep breath and let mana spread through his legs, ankles, and feet, just like Ethan had explained.
His muscles tightened. His center of gravity sank.
He gripped the branch with both hands.
"Now," Ethan said. "Three steps, jump, then thrust forward in mid air. Do not hesitate."
Oliver moved.
He kicked off the ground with all his strength.
The mana in his legs exploded, pushing him higher than usual.
For a moment, he felt like he was flying.
The Rock Snout Boar was still digging.
Then a chill ran over its skin.
A strange instinct screamed in its mind. The soft fat on its back trembled.
All its nonexistent hair stood up together.
It stopped digging.
It slowly turned its head, eyes already wide.
What it saw was a human boy hanging in the air behind it, branch in hand, teeth bared, eyes shining filled with hatred.
The boar's pupils shrank. It squealed in pure fear.
"Too late!" Oliver shouted.
He tightened his grip and thrust the branch forward with all his strength.
There was a loud smack as the tip of the branch landed hard and precisely on the boar's pink rear.
The Rock Snout Boar gave out a scream that echoed through the trees. Its whole body jolted, legs leaving the ground for an instant.
Even Ethan winced. 'That looked painful,' he thought.
Oliver landed in a crouch, rolled once to soften the impact, then popped back onto his feet. He looked at the boar with a satisfied expression.
The boar's eyes were wet.
It squeezed its hind legs together and ran without looking back, hooves digging into the mud as it sprinted with a speed it had never shown before.
Its body shook all over, and it made panicked snorting noises that sounded almost like crying.
"Good," Oliver said calmly. "Run. I will make sure to plug that hole forever so there will be no more pollution."
He raised the branch onto his shoulder and started sprinting after it.
Ahead, the boar's pace somehow increased again, as if it really understood his words.
Soon, a boar and a boy were rushing through the forest in a straight line. Branches snapped. Birds flew up in flocks.
Smaller beasts scattered out of their way, staring in confusion as the strange pair stormed past.
"Slow down a little," Ethan said helplessly. "We are going deeper into the forest. This is no longer the safe outer area."
Oliver's focus was locked on the fleeing pink back in front of him. He doesn't even heard what Ethan said.
Ethan did not know whether to laugh or cry.
'This kid's concentration is terrifying,' he thought.
He remembered how Oliver had made the hairpin for Fiona, spending hours fully focused at the workbench without even stopping for water.
'If he keeps this up,' Ethan thought, 'he really might become a main character.'
They crashed through another patch of undergrowth.
Up ahead, the trees opened into a slightly wider path.
On the side of that path, a familiar figure stood with a white fox at her feet.
Fiona had just finished taking down a beast. Blood still stained the ground near her.
The Silver Moon Fox's fur was smooth and clean, tail lightly raised.
She turned her head at the noise.
First she saw the pink boar, running as if all demons of hell were behind it.
Then she saw Oliver, branch in hand, chasing after it like a madman, hair messy, eyes shining with a strange light.
The fox instinctively lifted its tail and covered its own rear.
Fiona's expression froze.
"What is he doing…" she muttered.
Oliver's gaze did not move toward her even for half a heartbeat.
He did not see Fiona. He did not see the fox.
He only saw the boar and sped up.
Fiona's brows twitched.
For a moment, a complicated emotion flashed in her eyes.
It disappeared so quickly that even she might not have noticed it herself.
"Idiot," she said under her breath.
The Silver Moon Fox tilted its head and looked at her, then at Oliver's back as he disappeared into the trees again, shouting at the boar to stop running and accept its fate.
"This is dangerous," Ethan said, feeling the change in the air.
"The mana here is thicker. Are you sure you want to keep going? There is probably a strong beast ahead."
Oliver did not answer. His feet moved faster. Leaves flew.
The sound of hooves and footsteps echoed together as boy and boar rushed deeper into the forest.
In another part of the forest, instructors stared at their broken communicators and worried.
Far above the trees, the round sorcerer was flying at high speed. She did not use teleportation, avoiding any sudden surge of mana that might alert others.
Here, a boy with a branch chased a farting boar further and further into the Forest of Beasts.
The trees thinned. The ground turned rocky.
Soon, Oliver burst out of the last line of trees and found himself standing at the mouth of a rocky valley.
At the far side, set into the stone wall at the same level as he stood, yawned a huge dark cavern.
The boar skidded to a stop in front of the cavern and started squealing in panic.
Oliver saw the pink back in front of the dark cave and grinned.
"Got you," he said, lifting his branch.
The words had just left his mouth when a sound exploded from inside the cavern.
"GRRROOOARRRRR!!!!"
The rocky ground under Oliver's feet trembled. Dust drifted down from the valley walls.
The roar rolled out of the darkness like a wave, echoing across the stones, pounding against his chest.
The Rock Snout Boar's expression changed at once. Its eyes went wide.
All the fat on its body shook. It did not hesitate even a heartbeat.
With a terrified squeal, it turned and ran straight into the cavern, vanishing into the darkness as if something behind it was even scarier than Oliver.